Published: October 14th 2023, 9:45:04 am
Hi. This is one of those posts again where I have to explain myself. I wish I didn't let things get to this point all the time, but I do, so here I go again.
Sorry for being gone. I can make excuses all day long, and I got a few, but it's not much use. You've heard them all before. My mental health is always an issue and I have a personality disorder that makes me hide from the world and avoid things to a point where I am too ashamed to interact. That was an excuse anyway. Sorry. I really am.
The good news
The good news is that I haven't been sitting on my ass while I was gone. I don't know why I didn't post. It just got awkward and I got ashamed and it turned weird in my head. But I have actually been making good progress on the game.
Public release and Patreon
I'm not cut out for this "pay to play" shit really. That's why from 0.3 onward, I want to go public and work the same way I did on MAiH1. Anyone can play and Patreon supporters get extras. I soft-launched this starting now. I moved the old dev build over to the regular URL and took the password off.
The dev link is still passwordlocked and I will be uploading the latest version there more often. These versions will be a bit messier, with a higher possibility of WIP features, placeholder text and dead links.
I have just uploaded the latest 0.3 dev build as it is. It may be buggy and broken in places, but I wanted to show off what I've done over the last months I've been missing.
The password to open the game remains:
LAplay
Be aware that this is already prepared for public release and includes a Patreon begging page. Please click "Patreon / I have a code" and insert the following code to get all the Patreon benefits:
JustTheTip
What's new?
I've been setting up a lot of things mostly. There's new features (phone, maids, sex club), new content (Sadie Sink story coming along, new stores and locations), new girls (for now Kendall Jenner, Cara Delevingne and Karen Gillan but much more to come) and plenty of small stuff and bugfixes.
What's coming?
A lot. I'm mostly working on the core mechanics now. I have re-done the entire list of girls and added every single one that was on the to-do list, but they're not implemented yet until they're done or it'd break the game. This means that all 150+ girls will be coming very soon. I am also hard at work on the new base relationship mechanics. That means conversation mechanics, being able to invite a girl to your house, setting up dates, relationship types etc. This is all being set up through the new personality types and the new conversation system. The conversation system is supposed to replace a lot of things. You don't click "bootycall" or "date" anymore. You call up the girl you want to fuck or date and you ask her through conversation. It's more fluid, more natural and it should show off the new personality types well once it's up and running.
Dev process: back to fun, productive chaos
I had a bit of a MAiH burnout in july and august. I was forcing myself into this dev process that just wasn't fun, and it was because I wanted to do right by the paying patrons. Instead, it just bummed me out and got my avoidant behaviour in overdrive. I decided in september to try going back to what was fun on MAiH1: slight chaos. I work on what I want to work on now, and it's put the fun back into this hobby. It also made me 500% more productive. It's not always on what I shóuld be working on perhaps, but new content and features are getting added constantly and that's still a lot better than not adding anything.
The chaos is more controlled this time around though. I clearly mark passages that need writing work in the back end and I introduced a WIP widget that shows players where known dead ends are and which offers them a way to teleport home to not halt progress.
The future:
Hopefully I will get things back on track. I've been trying real hard to create more structure in my life and the game's dev process but I will probably have more of these moments. I plan to do more frequent dev build updates whenever I add new stuff and hope to have a 0.3 public release ready soon.
Thanks
For all the continued support. I've had a lot of lovely messages where I expected mostly death threats. Your patience is astonishing and your support warms my heart. To anyone who does feel like I've done them wrong, I understand fully. I really am sorry for being the way I am. Patreon doesn't allow refunds, but nothing is stopping you from unsubscribing whenever you're unsatisfied.